We’ve all heard those gut wrenching stories about people who have had to survive extreme dehydration by drinking their own urine, or maybe you have seen Bear Grylls drink it from a snake skin on the Discovery Channel. Now, researchers have discovered a way that urine can not only save your own life, but your phone’s battery life as well.

[Microbial fuel cells] don’t output much power and, until now, the researchers had only managed to accumulate very small amounts of power into capacitors for storage. Now they’ve successfully charged a Samsung handset enough to get some real – albeit limited – usage.

So, the next time you find yourself in a remote location and you’ve left your ZAGGsparq at home, maybe urinating to charge your phone will be the only other option you have to make that one last emergency call.